Evil Dead Regeneration

Posted: 09/16/05

After three cult-classic movies, Evil Dead has yet to see a decent video game. After a few rough attempts, Hail to the King and Fistful of Boomstick, THQ finally gets the formula right. Evil Dead: Regeneration breaks the curse of boring games with horrible control, making an action-adventure that's as fun to play, as the movies are to watch.

Bruce Campbell revives the iconic character of Ash for Regeneration. Set after the events in Evil Dead 2, Ash has been committed to the Sunny Meadows Mental Institution for the brutal murders of his four friends. There is a great tutorial level that flashes back to the classic cabin from the movies and lets you hack your way out. Ash’s lawyer, Sally, finds evidence that can prove Ash's innocense. But before she can do anything with it, Dr. Reinhard unleashes evil into our world by reading aloud from the Necronomicon, the Book of the Dead.

This blatantly contradicts Army of Darkness, the third in the series, so it doesn’t follow the trilogy’s storyline. But each movie has retold the same events in different ways, and Regeneration does the same. And like the classic Raimi films, Regeneration has got lots of horror-movie-humor that will make you laugh out loud more than once.

Ash must escape from the mental hospital and team up with a half-deadite named Sam, voiced by Ted Raimi. Being a deadite, Sam can die multiple times, which solves the problem of getting penalized when your sidekick gets killed. Sam can be smashed, shredded, or thrown off a cliff and he’ll rise from the dead again. This makes the little guy helpful, and entertaining.

Whenever you play as Ash, two things are essential: a shotgun and a chainsaw. These two are Ash's trademark, and your primary arsenal. It’s unbelievably fun to weild your boomstick and chainsaw at the same time, and there are some great combos and finishing moves. The game also features a pistol and bomb lance which sticks into enemies and blows them up. For your right knobby arm, there is also a flamethrower for barbequing deadites, and harpoon gun that can pull an enemy up close. As fun as it is to harpoon something and then blast it into the air for a juggling act, you'll always come back to the chainsaw for the most joyful carnage.

By collecting enough yellow Evil Essence, Ash can unleash the evil within and rip through a horde of deadites with ease. This is a cool feature, and a reference from the films, but you don't end up using it that often. It's definitely not necessary to complete the game.

You can also possess and control your zombie sidekick Sam, and sneak into small areas, use his spirit stun attack, or ride piggy-back on a giant deadite monster. You can also punt Sam, like a football, and watch him stun enemies, rip their heads off, or fly helplessly into a circular fan.

Unfortunately, the game only provides six or seven hours of gameplay but the levels end before they get old. Some of the objectives can get repetitive, but nothing gets too boring because the game is too short.

Bruce Campbell has never looked better, in a video game. His in-game model has a lot of personality when the camera gets up close and personal. While the over all graphics aren’t amazing, and it lacks a lot of texture, they do the job.

The cinemas capture the style of the Evil Dead movies perfectly, from crazy POV of “evil” to the Raimi classic Oldsmobile. Above all else, Regeneration features Bruce Campbell doing what he does best, delivering one-liners when most people would be running for their lives.

There are a bunch of extras to find throughout the game as well. Most are not hard to hunt for, and there's a nice payoff in the end. They unlock game art and videos of Bruce and Ted recording their voices, and talking about the past and future highlights of their careers.

While a lot of people may complain about the game’s shortcomings, it’s still tons of fun to hack and shoot-up deadites. The story is over too soon, but it’s really funny, and only $19.99. If you’re a fan of the Evil Dead movies, or love listening to Bruce Campbell, and have 20 bucks lying around. Evil Dead Regeneration is going to be money well spent.

Publishers/DevelopersIf you have questions about the site or a piece of media that you would like included on gametrailers.com, we would love to hear from you. Send us an email at: trailers@gametrailers.com

GamersAny issues with the site? Are there broken links? Is there a trailer you are looking for that you can't find? Do you want to heap praise upon us? Send us an email at: webmaster@gametrailers.com